Friday, October 6, 2006

For Falcon 1, the Power Plant news from the International Space Fellowship

We are finishing the welding on a batch of 14 of our bipropellant Liquid Fuel motors. These are not optimized for vacuum use, but are similar to what we will use to accelerate from LEO to Lunar Transfer, brake into Lunar orbit, and descend to the Moon. These motors will actually go into both level 1 and Level 2 “Northrup Grumman Lunar Lander competition” (NGLL) vehicles, and “Earth Launched” Space Diving demonstrators. These spaceflight simulations – on Earth – are more demanding that actual spaceflight due to the lower ISP in air, the greater thrust required with one G, and the faster control dynamics. (Other factors present in space are reduced or avoided.)

We have nearly 100 of our flight qualified, ultralight fuel tanks in stock. These lightweight high pressure tanks make the high mass ratio (and low empty weight) of our pressure fed rocket systems possible: without this factor, our projected missions would be impossible. Note that all our mass projections are based on measured systems mass, not theoretical predictions.

Our NGLL systems use four to ten of these fuel tanks. The Ten tanks hold up to 350 pounds of fuel, and (with less than 50 pounds system empty weight) this makes the landing of a 300 pound astronaut (with pressure suit and life support) on the Moon possible. This is our Crusader HTS (Human Transport System) configuration.